When the explosion finally went off, Harold braced himself. Each second felt like an eternity. A big fire licked up the side of the house. Harold could hear the debris scattering from the explosion, though from this angle he could not see more than a few small pieces flung onto the lawn.
The fire still raged despite the rain. The blaze was definitely feeding on the remaining oil from the tanks. It would not be extinguished by the rain alone.
Then, the front door finally burst open. A young man with his camo mask rolled up onto the top of his head, leaving his face exposed, bolted into the rain. With his face exposed, Harold suddenly found it harder to shoot him. His screams and panic only added to the difficulty. He seemed genuinely afraid.
And these men already have killed one of our own and abducted two girls, Harold thought. Harold also spied the firearm in the man’s belt. Once the man gathered his wits, he quickly would pose a threat once again.
So Harold squeezed the trigger. One shot put him down on the wet lawn.
A second man, much burlier and menacing, emerged from the door but acted no less afraid. He shouted a spate of curses as he flailed about. Harold quickly dropped him with two shots.
A third man spilled out on the burly man’s heels. Harold spun his gun around, but then the man lurched backward and fell onto the ground. Harold hadn’t taken that shot. With a sigh, he glanced to his left. Matthew was sticking out of his hiding place with his gun drawn. With the pounding rain, Harold could not glimpse his son’s face. Was he showing pain or horror for having to take a life?
Damn. Harold was so angry that he dropped the fourth guy without a second thought. Where the hell is Carl?
A fifth man sprang out, his back on fire. A lick of flame shot out of the open door behind him. The fire obviously had reached the kitchen, where many of the men were. Harold fired, but only caught the man in the leg. He fell over, screaming in agony. Harold quickly emptied two more shots into the man’s back, ending his suffering.
Harold gritted his teeth. Shooting these men was horrific work. Necessary, but horrific.
He aimed his gun back at the door, but no one emerged. The line of fleeing men suddenly had ceased. What had happened to the rest, and what was Carl doing?
At the time the explosion went off, Michael and Preston had taken positions near the back door. The two men kept their eyes locked onto the window where Tara and Shyanne were being held, waiting impatiently for the right moment.
When Carl had fired the first shot, Michael had leaped from his hiding place, but then Preston shouted, “Wait!” There was no explosion.
Then seconds later there was. The loud bang shook the ground and rattled the house. However, Preston’s shout had drawn the attention of Tara and Shyanne’s guard. The man who was guarding the room marched right up to the window to look out into the yard.
Preston, gritting his teeth, raised his gun at the window. Michael, fearful of Preston hitting Tara, shouted, “Wait!” but Preston already was in the process of squeezing his trigger. A section of the window frame suddenly shattered, and the man inside fell backward.
Michael wasn’t going to wait any longer. He ran for the back door. But upon seizing the doorknob, he found it was locked. “No! No!” he shouted as he yanked on it.
“Get back!” Preston cried. Michael jumped back as Preston aimed his weapon at the doorknob. Preston fired two shots that split open the lock below the knob. Michael then pushed on the door and successfully flung it open.
Preston wanted to dash in first, but Michael raced in upon flinging the door open. Preston followed his lead. Once inside, the two men suddenly were assaulted by a thick wave of smoke.
“Tara!” Michael cried out.
“Their room!” Preston turned to the hall beside them. The door to their right had to lead to the room where the two were being held captive.
Michael tugged on the knob. Again, it was locked. “Damn!” Even worse, loud shouts and thumps were coming from the other side of the door. A struggle was taking place. Michael aimed his gun at the metal plate just below the knob and fired. With a couple of shots, he broke through the lock.
Preston kicked open the door, revealing the room where their friends were being held captive and uncovering the source of the noise. Tara was beating on the man who Preston had shot. Although the front of the man’s shirt was soaked with blood, the wound was not enough to incapacitate the guard, but Tara must have thought he was weak enough to take down. At the moment, the two were struggling hard, with neither of them showing signs of buckling.
Shyanne was standing on the bed that lay against the wall. She was shouting at Tara, “Get him! Get him!”
“Shyanne!” Preston rushed onto the bed and grabbed her.
“Mister Preston!” Shyanne hugged him.
At that moment, the guard let out a loud shout and shoved Tara to the floor. “Bitch!” Although the man now was shaking, perhaps due to blood loss, he raised his fists to smash Tara’s skull in.
He never got the chance.
Instead of his fists crushing Tara’s cranium, Michael suddenly slammed the man’s head into the rest of the window Preston had shot.
“Damn you!” Michael screamed over and over again as he assailed the man repeatedly with punch after punch.
Michael then grabbed the now semiconscious man and rammed him into the window over and over again, breaking more and more of the glass until fatigue set in and he released Tara’s attacker. The man slumped down onto the floor and did not move again.
Panting, Michael turned around. Tara, now on her feet, was staring at him, wide eyed. Michael glanced at the battered form of Tara’s attacker before returning his gaze to the redhead.
“Are…you okay?” Michael asked.
Tara nodded. “And what about you?”
Michael swallowed. “I--I don’t know yet.” He wiped the remaining rainwater as well as some sweat from his face.
Tara then pulled him close and hugged him. “Thank you,” she said.
Michael held her tightly. “Thank God. I…I found you.”
On the bed, Preston and Shyanne parted. “And what about you?” Preston asked Shyanne. “Are you alright?”
Shyanne nodded. “I told Tara not to be scared.”
Tara then turned her head. “You silly little girl. I told you that.”
Preston chuckled. “We--we can exchange stories later. This place is on fire. We got to—”
All of a sudden, Shyanne screamed. Not a full second later, Nichols smashed through the rest of the window, his torso hanging through the window into the room. The former soldier looked like an utter monster, with his teeth bared, several small cuts marring his face, and small trickles of blood leaking down the sides of his face. The man reached out for Tara, but Michael quickly pushed her out of his reach.
But before any of them could take further action against Nichols, a strong arm seized Nichols by the back of his shirt. The arm came through the window, behind Nichols, and dragged him back through the window to the outside yard, flinging him to the wet grass. Carl, looking battered and bloodied, then turned to his friends.
“Go!” he shouted, “Run, now!”
Preston scooped up Shyanne. “You heard the man. Let’s go!”
Michael swung his leg and kicked the door fully open, permitting all of them a clear path to flee from the room.
Carl spared as much of a glance as he could to watch through the window Michael and Preston flee the room with Tara and Shyanne before he turned to bar Nichols’s path back to the house. Carl would finish the traitor off out here in the rain.
“You saw that, you son of a bitch!” Carl shouted to Nichols. “I freed my friends! Ha! Suck on that you piece of shit!”
Nichols by now acted as if all humanity had been stripped from him. He didn’t respond verbally to Carl’s taunts. Instead, he just shouted wildly and threw another punch. Carl took it. The blow only had half the strength of Nichols’s earlier punches. Carl then slammed his knuckle
s into Nichols’s mouth. A tooth shot out into the grass. Even with that hit, Carl believed he could have thrown a stronger punch. The two combatants were nearing the ends of their limits.
Nichols struck once again, this time grabbing Carl by the shoulders, narrowly missing his neck. Carl struggled to get free. Nichols backed Carl down the lawn toward the edge of the ravine, where the land sloped downward into the woods.
Behind Nichols, a sudden burst of flame erupted from the broken window. The fire had broken through into the room where Tara and Shyanne had been held captive. Although Carl’s friends had escaped the room, they had yet to emerge through the back door. Carl grew worried. If they didn’t escape from the house soon, they would become trapped or asphyxiate from the smoke.
But Nichols was pushing him farther and farther from the house. His boots were nearing the edge of the level land. A couple of more steps, and he would fall over. Baring his teeth, he fought back against Nichols with all the strength he could muster. At the same time, he turned around. Now the ravine was no longer to his back.
“This…is…for…every soldier…you killed!” Carl cried as he struggled. Then, with an added burst of strength, he swung Nichols hard around toward the drop-off. But he didn’t succeed in flinging him over.
However, Nichols’s left foot slipped off the edge. He tried to kick back up with his right boot, but Carl slammed Nichols good with a head butt. That blow, plus the force of gravity, finally released Nichols. Though dizzy from the head strike, Carl watched Nichols plunge down the ravine and drop from sight.
Rubbing his head, Carl hurried to the edge. He almost slipped, so he grasped onto a nearby tree for support. Nichols had rolled down the slope and impacted something, for he suddenly was screaming and yelling in pain. Then he yanked himself up into a standing position. Blood started gushing out of his left upper torso. He had impaled himself upon a sharp piece of wood protruding from the ground.
Nichols clutched the wound, but the blood spilled out so intensely that his hand was coated with it. The rain fought a losing battle to keep his hand clear. Even the water pooling around Nichols’s legs was turning red.
Nichols let out a final vile profanity before falling to his knees, then dropping face down into the water.
Carl bowed his head, his thoughts returning to the men and women of Camp Jefferson. “There you go, Parker,” he said quietly, “Rico, Sheri, Colonel Sanchez, every one of you. We won this.”
Well, perhaps they had not won this quite yet. He had yet to confirm Ben’s demise, plus he had not accounted for all of his friends. He couldn’t call this is a victory until Ben and his operation were totally defeated.
He turned back to the house, but a wave of dizziness stopped him in his tracks. He was in rough shape. He had taken several blows to the head and a few cuts as well, going back to his fight with Michael. Without his gun, he’d be helpless if he had to fight another opponent.
He slapped himself. Get it together, Marine! You’re not done with this yet!
Carl had gathered enough of his wits to remember where Nichols had forced away his gun. He quickly found it and scooped it up, wiping away a slick of mud from the barrel. Now he could take on Ben or any of his remaining men.
With the gun in hand, Carl made for the ranch house’s back door. It still was open. Carl wasted no time racing back through the door and into the hall.
“Tara! Preston! Michael! Shyanne!” Carl shouted as he pushed his way past the smoke. There was an open door off to the side, but the room within was empty. Michael and Preston must have retrieved Tara and Shyanne, but where did they go? If they had fled outside, they would have met with Carl out there, called to him, or something.
Carl still had to check out the house just to confirm that they weren’t trapped somewhere inside. However, a pile of wreckage soon barred his way farther down the hallway. Carl recognized a bathroom on the other side. The explosion must have blown out this section of the hall.
However, the wreckage did not completely obstruct another open doorway to Carl’s left. There was a space big enough for someone to squeeze through. Perhaps his friends had made it through here.
Carl ducked down through the gap to emerge into a devastated living room. The smoke was bad in here as well, but at least Carl could make out the outlines of two human beings. However, as Carl approached the figures, he was faced with an unwelcome sight.
Ben, no longer wearing his camo mask, was clutching an unconscious Preston. Ben now was wearing a firefighter’s mask with an oxygen tank.
“What did I tell you, Carl?” Ben said. “You should have stayed out of this. But you had to go do the grand heroic thing and follow us. Well, guess what? I’m pissed. You probably can’t tell through this mask, but I’m pissed.” Then he gave Preston a jerk that shook the man’s whole body. “Now your friend here is going to pay the price.” Carl trembled. His rescue plan had just hit a horrible snag—and Preston might end up dying because of it.
Find out what happens in part four! Available Now!
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Silent Interruption (Book 3): An Uncertain Passage Page 16